Use of mobile wallets such as Gcash in Boracay still needed boost’

(photo by: Je Lyn)
Jun N. Aguirre
BORACAY Island, Malay Aklan- Niven Maquirang, the officer-in-charge of the Port Cruise Ship Operation and Special Project, cites a need to popularize the use of mobile wallets on this resort island.
This development came after Maquirang earlier announced to the local media that 18 international cruise ships are expected to arrive on this resort island this year. More cruise ships are expected to arrive here until the year 2025.
“Use of mobile wallets are not yet very much popular in Boracay as many hotels, restaurants and souvenir shops are still not patronizing the use of e-wallets,” he said, adding that many residents and tourists here are still using cash as payment.
Melvin Calimag, a tech journalist from Metro Manila, agreed on the possibility of popularizing the use of e-wallets on this resort island.
“It is easy to pay via e-wallet wherever you are, no need to go to the bank to deposit the payment. It’s also safer because there is no need to bring cash with you,” Calimag who produces www.newsbytes.ph said.
In January 2022, several tourists were surprised upon seeing a Taho vendor accepting GCash as a payment.
The taho vendor was identified as Reynaldo Indolos. He said he uses GCash and also Pay Maya due to the demand of several tourists asking for mobile wallets as payment.
The Facebook post of tourist Roanne Tadina gathered 22,000 reactions, 551 comments, and 1,400+ shares.
Indolo lived in Barangay Manocmanoc, Boracay.
Tadina, in her Facebook post, narrated that she forgot her wallet in the hotel room and that she thrives on buying taho.
Luckily, she met Indolos, and through the use of her mobile, she was able to purchase a taho worth P50.
Another tourist from Quezon City named Jelynn also shares her experience buying taho in Boracay using GCash.
Desiree Segovia, chair of the Boracay Women’s Producers Cooperative (BWPC) said they have also started to appreciate the use of GCash.
“At first, I was not convinced to use the mobile wallet because of failed transactions. It was however, fixed after we reported it to the system. Right now, we continue to use GCash. We started using GCash only in August 2022,” she said.
The BWPC is a group of thousands of women in Boracay engaging in social entrepreneurship.The GCash app was first introduced on the island in December 2018.
The Maya app (formerly known as Paymaya) was launched here in April 2019. Both of the e-wallets only started to become popular in 2022
The delay in the popularity of e-wallets on this resort island could be attributable to the COVID pandemic in 2019-2021.
According to the Malay Tourism Office, Boracay registered more than 1.75 million tourism arrivals in 2022. They expect more tourists to arrive on Boracay Island this year.
Boracay was recently named one of the top 50 Instagrammable places in the world. Because of this, local tourism officials expect a tourism boom this year.